Sebé-Pedrós, Arnau
ICREA Research Professor at Centre de Regulació Genòmica (CRG).
Life & Medical Sciences
Short biography
I am an evolutionary biologist interested in how genome sequence and its regulation translate into diverse cellular phenotypes. I obtained a Ph.D. in Genetics from the University of Barcelona and I then was a postdoctoral fellow at the Weizmann Institute of Science. In my group, we investigate the evolution of cell type programs and associated genome regulation. When did major animal cell types like neurons emerge? How do gene regulatory networks evolve? And how these genetic changes translate into cellular novelties? To answer these questions, we combine single-cell genomics, chromatin profiling, and comparative genomics methods in a phylogenetically diverse array of animals and unicellular eukaryotes.
Research interests
My general research interests are related to two major biological questions. First, how genome sequence and its regulation translate into specific cellular phenotypes; and, second, how this genotype-phenotype link evolves. These interests include multiple specific topics at the crossroads of genomics, epigenetics, transcriptomics, ontogeny, and evolution. My ultimate goal is to advance our understanding of the evolutionary patterns and general principles explaining the genotype-(cellular)phenotype relationship through the eyes of genome regulation and at macro and micro-evolutionary timescales.